For many years now, we’ve been coaxing a second hand, child trailer into service as a cargo trailer.  It served us well, but was a beast to haul around and was pretty much constructed with fabric, which became increasingly patched.  Ultimately, we were going to have to put some significant money into keeping this trailer running and decided it just wasn’t worth it.

One of the features we really liked about the trailer was that it had two connection points with the bike.  Perhaps we are paranoid, but it made us uncomfortable as we looked at the majority of cargo trailers and they only had a single connection point.

I’d heard and read about many people who have raved about BOB trailers.  The guys at Legend Bicycle let us borrow a 19 year old BOB for a weekend to do a test grocery run and some general riding.  My first impression of the BOB, on the ride home from the bike shop, is that it was a pleasure to ride with.  The trailer was empty and I barely even knew it was there.  The really nice part of a single wheel trailer is that it tracks the bike nearly perfectly; if my shoulders and handlebars make it through a gap, then the trailer likely will as well.

During our weekend test, we discovered that the BOB wasn’t quite big enough to handle our weekly grocery run for the family.  Aside from this fact, we loved the trailer and weren’t excited about going back to the drawing board.  Either we would need to switch to making more grocery runs during the week or come up with some other option.  While researching other options, I discovered that Greenspeed makes a rack for the BOB.  With the addition of this rack and a couple of panniers, we figured it would give us just the space we needed to keep our grocery run down to once a week.

Obviously, we ultimately went this route.  We’ve had the trailer for just over a week now and the rack and panniers for less than a week.  Karen made the first grocery run earlier this week without the panniers and made it, but is looking forward to the little bit of extra space. We also splurged and added a kickstand to the setup.  Yes, you can kick the trailer over at about a 90 degree angle and have it hold up the bike/trailer combination.  However, when we played around with this technique with the borrowed trailer and found that, when fully loaded, it could be a bear to pull it out of this setup.  You can’t just grab the bike and yank, because it puts a ton of strain on the bike trailer connection and will likely fatigue over time.  Adding a kickstand allows us to load the trailer pretty inline with the bike and easily get rolling.

We will try and post an update after we have a few (hundred?) miles under our belt with the setup.

Picked up a new lid today. A nice high viz helmet, with reflective strips, two built in lights and a mount for a third light. Every little thin I can do to make sure cars can see me will only help!

Wow… yesterday was a big day for me.  Thanks to all of my amazing friends, family, co-workers and those even more distant, I passed my fundraising goal!  When this was orginally set, I was honestly nervous about raising so much money… I’ve never done anything even remotely close to this level of fundraising.  I’ve been blown away by people’s generousity and support.  Thanks!  Now it’s time to re-evaluate and see what we can do about setting a new goal.

The second big challenge was our spin session.  I pushed it hard this past Sunday and went away truly feeling it.  All I wanted to do when I got home was to grab a nap, but Sunday afternoons is our family swim time so it was off to the pool.  It was not my most vigorous swim ever, but I made it and logged a good 3+ hours of honest physical activity.  I’ve already noticed some improvement on the bike.  Many sessions and miles to go, but it certainly seems like something I can achieve… if I continue to work dilligently.  It’s a powerful motivator when you think about the fact that those fighting cancer are working so much harder… certainly doesn’t make you one to complain.

Our training continues… but I still can’t meet my goal without your help.  If you haven’t donated yet, please visit my fundraising page:

http://pages.teamintraining.org/ri/ambbr11/mdieterich

Please donate what you can, every donation helps!

We spun for a bit over an hour today, definitely enough to induce some pain, but nothing compared to what people battling cancer are dealing with every single day.  As I headed into this session, I couldn’t get out of my mind how far reaching cancer is.  Almost everyone who I speak to these days has some connection, I’ve heard from so many people as they donate about their stories and their connections.  I have SO many more reasons to complete this ride than I did just two weeks ago.  Just yesterday, I learned a good friend of mine and a pediatrician has a patient who just came out of remission for Leukemia.  Can you imagine?  I have no idea how young this child is, it doesn’t really matter, clearly they have the vast majority of their life still ahead of them.  Yet, here they are, battling with Leukemia… preparing again for a battle so fierce that many of us, if we are so lucky, will never experience how deep (s)he must dig to pull through.

It’s clear to me that this is my time, my chance to do something to help out kids like this and other people facing cancer.

We had our first group spin session this morning.  It was a great opportunity to see just how out of shape I am.   We had almost 22 people show up for the session and were told that if everyone who expressed interest in joining the team does so, we will be nearly 40 strong!

This is the first time I’ve ever tried spinning.  I’d heard horror stories from other cyclists about how many spin instructors focused mostly on strength training rather than “spinning”, which could actually lead to knee problems.  Fortunately, our instructor is also the team cycle coach, so his focus was really on building strength needed to ride a bicycle.  The one down side, it was really hot!  I definitely need to bring more water to the next Sunday’s session.

If you are interested in supporting my efforts you can do so online at:

http://pages.teamintraining.org/ri/ambbr11/mdieterich